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SG 50 Jubilee weekend & free/ discounted events sounds like a perfect time for outings, but nuh-uh, bad idea. I should have stayed at home instead.

My poor little siblings were lamenting about being stuck at home and staring at their homework till they had migraines, so I thought that a short day-trip (my treat!) would be a welcome respite for them.

Sentosa seems like an awesome destination... till we saw the crowd.

Free public transport = getting pressed against hordes of people. Imagine being suffocated amidst piles of hot sweaty bodies. URGH. Claustrophobia. :( I requested for permission to drive my sibs to Sentosa but my parents don't trust my driving skills enough. What's the use of a license if you don't get to practise (and I can't get hold of the car keys)? :/

Amazing view. :)

On a side note, I had to try so hard to get a decent picture at the boardwalk without getting photobombed by oblivious passerbys. The extent of the crowd would be exemplified by the ridiculous 2-hour waiting time for the Monorail. Might as well burn some calories and walk across the boardwalk.

When we finally squeezed onto the shuttle and alighted at Siloso Beach, we saw this pretty cool band basking.

With the blasted sun and long walk to the Sands of Time exhibition, my sibs started whining about the distance... So tempted to just hop onto a buggy. >.<

Finally there.

There were a series of impressive sand art depicting Singapore's history and national identity.

We were all in awe at the skills of the artists.

Being typical tourists in our own country, we went on for some Luge + skyride fun.

Watch out for these reckless drivers! XD (Not that I was particularly safe either, snapping pictures while holding onto the steering handle single-handedly, and overtaking my sibs.)

Skyride.

The sole advantage of the sky ride is to enjoy the sea breeze. :)

We intended to explore other parts of the island but the dreadful crowds dampened our spirits so much so that all we wanted was to get to a nice, air-conditioned spot near our home to chill and have some ice-cream.

That cut short our otherwise "cool" sib-outing without parental supervision.

At least I promised them more sib outings in future, during their school holidays. (Of course they're elated for it's always my treat. >.< Duties of the oldest sibling... Sighs.)

It was an amazing experience working with the Rag family. Building everything from scratch, and seeing our months of hard work culminate into a single breathtakingly fantastic performance was MAGICAL. Looking back, the "building-taking it all down-then reconstruction" process was frustrating, but without all the nitpicking and drive for perfection, it wouldn't have been possible for us to bag the awards. The crazy weekends back in school, last-minute night prop-making, and even the penknife-cut I've sustained from ops felt worthwhile.

It was my first full rag experience as an M-squared. :') I would have preferred participating as a dancer but due to my other commitments (in planning for the Student Medical-Nursing Education Conference), I had no choice but to take on a less-demanding role in Rag. Still, I'm glad to have been part of it all.

In commemoration of SG50 and NUS110, Rag 2015 was held at the Floating Platform at Marina Bay, so as expected, it was a really big event. I managed to get tickets to the show, but I couldn't find my batch mates, so I ended up as the lone person from Med cheering in a crowd full of FASS students.

>.<

The amazing view.

The performances of the other faculties (This was the Faculty of Dentistry).

Fireworks.

The beautiful night view.

I was super thrilled to be able to see Gentle Bones, The Sam Willows and Christina Grimmie live. Christina Grimmie was super cute and she sounded even more fantastic in real life.

Most locals are no stranger to Swee Choon. With more than 50 years of heritage, it's one of the most established dim sum places around.

Located at Jalan Besar, it occupies the space of four shophouses. Due to its popularity, long queues are no surprise (no reservations are allowed).

Besides dine-ins, you can also take-away your favourite dim sum at their take-away counter. :) I "da-pao-ed" some home for my family.

When I reached, my JC classmates had already gotten us a table.

Phew. There was no need for me to queue.

Happy Wee Ling, Chen Ting and Jia Qi!

(Check out the pictures of Swee Choon's dim sum on the walls!)

Xiao Long Bao! (4 for $4 - a tad expensive)

With its thin but firm skin, tender meat and tasty soup, that is definitely a must-try!

The Mee Sua Kueh kind of reminds me of Maggi Mee. Don't be fooled by its appearances. It is amazingly delish! The crispy mee sua coating the soft carrot cake made the kueh stand out from all the other kuehs that I've tried. We ordered 5 whole plates (aka 30+ pieces) of it.

That was like a dry-wrapped "sushi" roll. It looks cute, but tasted average and dry.

As no one kept count when ordering, we ended up with 57 platters of dim sum, and way too much to finish. Everyone was simply stuffing ourselves. In the end, we had to resort to playing 终极密码 and eating the extra food as forfeit. T__T

Moral of the story? Never let Wen Hao order food ever again.

#youdimsum,yougainsum.

Wasn't it a punny caption? >.<

We averaged around $20/pax for that meal. Based on Jia Qi's past experiences, normal meals should only be around $15/pax. Yup, definitely a sign that we over-ordered.

Our final 13SO3C group photo!

Though I agree that Swee Choon might be overrated (it isn't exactly as mindblowingly delicious as what reviews rave about), it's still pretty value-for-money, considering the amount of dim sum that we have ordered. It's rare nowadays to get decent dim sum at such prices.

For starters, what are poached eggs if their yolks weren't runny? Imagine my disappointment when I prodded the egg with my fork, and all I saw was a yellow lump of almost-solid yolk. The other egg at least, had a teeny bit of yolk oozing out, but still, it wasn't a good rendition of Eggs Benny.

When they include "Truffle" in the name, I had expected more of the rich, earthy, unique taste of truffle. It was barely discernible.

Thank goodness the brioche was decent and its crisp-edge-fluffy-inside combination cheered me up a little.

However wonderful the smoked ham and spinach tasted, it could never quite erase my memory of the lacklustre poached eggs, if you could call it poached at all.

Brunch wasn't as gratifying as expected, and nope, the price wasn't justifiable.

Celline had the Salmon Royale and Earl Grey.

As Pacamara is more well-known for their coffee and blends, I suppose I should brush that disappointing brunch off my mind and focus more on their coffee instead.

A cuppa in hand and a laptop in front - Pacamara has the perfect ambience for you to do your work in peace.

Post-brunch, I decided to stay on a little while more to get some work done, and ordered a $6 cup of Mocha. The latte art was... hmm. Nice try. I was hoping for something more instagram-worthy. At least the smooth mocha redeemed it.

People say the hardest part of leaving for college is leaving your friends.

With classmates studying in the States and UK, meet ups are rare occurrences. Inevitably, distance may cause friendships to fade into near-silence, but I'm really heartened to see that in 408's case, distance has made the heart grow fonder. :')

I was so touched when Ash suggested a 408 gathering first thing when she got back from US during her summer break. The last time we met was a year ago, so it's definitely time for some catch-ups.

We celebrated Moi's birthday (belated).

Look at happy Moi with her cake and card! :)

(It was a French pun on her name...)

And when we saw the RGS girls at 313 Somerset with the familiar navy-blue uniform, yellow name-tags and rolled-up sleeves, we started reminiscing about the good ole days. We were the previous batch of yellow-name-tags, and the sight of them made us feel really old.

In between our conversation, we spontaneously burst out into song in the middle of the food court. Batch songs, house cheers, and etc. We could actually still remember the lyrics! I do hope we weren't judged too badly by the others around us.

All gatherings have to come to an end. :( Hopefully we'll have one more class outing in Dec!